The Lynching Quizzes

The Lynching Quiz

1 In what year was "The Lynching" first published?
1920

1919

1921

1917
2 How can we best describe the function of the poem's form?
As a critique of America's perverse love of lynching

As a plea asking God to intervene

As a prayer for the victim of the lynching

As a report on the specifics of a particular case
3 What Christian concept does the phrase "awful sin" refer to?
Eternal sin

Venial sin

Original sin

Divine intervention
4 What color are the women's "steely" eyes in line 12?
Blue

Brown

The poem does not say

Green
5 What word does McKay rather surprisingly not capitalize?
Father

Day

Fate

Spirit
6 What is the name of the 1922 collection of McKay's poetry that includes "The Lynching"?
The Weary Blues

Home to Harlem

Harlem Shadows

Songs of Protest
7 What do the children do in the poem's final line?
Dance

Run Away

Cry

Stare
8 What details does the poem tell us about the victim?
The poem tells us his age

The poem does not tell us any details

The poem tells us where he is from

The poem tells us his profession
9 How many similes and metaphors does McKay use in the poem?
None

Two

Four

Six
10 What feature of the "Shakespearean" sonnet form does the poem employ?
A final rhyming couplet

An ABAB rhyme scheme in stanza 1

A division into octave and sestet

An EFEF rhyme scheme in stanza 3
11 What verb does the poem use to describe the women coming to look at the body?
Thronged

Gathered

Crowded

Filed
12 What consonant sound is repeated several times in the opening line?
"T" sound

"N" sound

"S" sound

"B" sound
13 Where are the religious terms located in the poem?
All in the beginning

Dispersed throughout the poem

Only at the beginning and the end

All in the end
14 What is the poetic term for the ABBA, CDDC, and EFFE stanzas that the poem employs?
Mirror stanzas

Petrarchan stanzas

Envelope stanzas

Folded stanzas
15 Which of the following words does McKay NOT use to refer to the victim?
Char

Corpse

Thing

Body
16 What notable formal feature is only used in the poem's third quatrain?
Caesura

Enjambment

Apostrophe

Personification
17 Which of the following poets also wrote a poem entitled "The Lynching"?
Countee Cullen

Langston Hughes

Anne Spencer

Dorothea Mathews
18 What syntactical element—typically common in McKay's poetry—is NOT present in "The Lynching"?
Parentheses

Exclamation points

Semicolons

Conjunctions
19 How does the speaker describe the crowds in line 9?
White

Mixed

Large

Steely
20 What famous star does McKay allude to in the second stanza?
The Dog Star

Halley's Comet

The Star of David

The North Star
21 What does Dorothea Mathew's "The Lynching" have in common with McKay's poem?
An emphasis on the interiority of the victim

A description of stars above the scene

References to animals

A neutral description of the lynch mob
22 What does the "bright and solitary star" ultimately do to the victim?
It gives him up

It guides him

It commemorates him

It comforts him
23 Which of the following is NOT a central theme of the poem?
Forgiveness of sin

The dehumanization and objectification of black bodies

The incomparable horrors of lynching

The continuity of racial violence
24 Which of the following characteristics does "The Lynching" share with McKay's "America"?
Its conception of masculinity

Its radical use of the sonnet form

Its sense that America's empire will fall

Its heavy reliance on figurative language
25 What does "The Lynching" have in common with "If We Must Die"?
Explicit comparisons to inhuman predators and monsters

A trenchant critique of racialized violence

An idealized notion of masculinity

A classical conception of heroism

Are you referring to The Lynching?

Asked by ciara D #1240880

Answered by Aslan on 6/2/2022 4:52 PM

Claude McKay 1889-1948 Lynching

In the year before McKay published "The Lynching," 76 black men and women were lynched, the highest number in 15 years, and records suggest that 4,743 people—3,446 of them black—were lynched between 1882 and 1968, though many lynchings also went...

Asked by Wizyblack W #1155421

Answered by jill d #170087 on 5/31/2021 10:07 AM

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What is the mood

Inthink the mood uses a sense of irony to convey a feeling of horror and tragedy.

Asked by Djimon L #916243

Answered by Aslan on 7/16/2019 3:37 PM

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The Lynching

by Claude McKay

The Lynching Quiz

The Lynching Questions and Answers

Study Guide for The Lynching

Essays for The Lynching